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[SOLVED?] Thinkpad T470p Mint battery recalibration

Hi all

EDIT / TL;DR / Solution: I think the calibration is working. I checked my measurement adaptation using the Power Statistics in Linux Mint and this is the new one now:

Seems like it's adapting, it's just slow. If this doesn't work, I'll update again. Cheers!

I just changed the external battery of this T470p I bought. The old one was at about 70% battery life and was smaller at 4.4Ah. New one is around 6.34Ah.

The battery lasts almost double the time now so it's great, but, the % reading in Gnome Power Manager (bottom right tray) is way off. The laptop dies at around 40%. Ofc the estimated time left is also way off.

I did buy the battery for around 30% cheaper than I find it here from Aliexpress: https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32637096491.html (perhaps it's just weird, but it does last longer)

I tried

  • Drained the battery by playing youtube then recharged over night.
  • Installed and recalibrared with TLP (let it discharge with TLP running, plug in while off, leave it plugged over night) (this uninstalled power-profiles-daemon - I later uninstalled TLP and reinstalled that package).
  • Checked BIOS for a battery recalibration utility. I found none unfortunately. I looked everywhere including Config (there was no Power menu there). I also looked in the hardware diagnostic software that I can access instead of booting into BIOS. I believe the key was F10.
  • Checked the settings app, nothing.
  • Checked online, everyone says use TLP or discharge manually repeatedly without charging partially in between.

This is what my discharge profile looks like

Laptop with old battery next to it:

These are my battery readings

marin@ThinkpadT470P:~$ acpi -i
Battery 0: Discharging, 84%, 04:45:31 remaining
Battery 0: design capacity 6282 mAh, last full capacity 6282 mAh = 100%
marin@ThinkpadT470P:~$ sudo tlp-stat -b
--- TLP 1.6.1 --------------------------------------------

+++ Battery Care
Plugin: thinkpad
Supported features: charge thresholds, recalibration
Driver usage:
* natacpi (thinkpad_acpi) = active (charge thresholds, recalibration)
Parameter value ranges:
* START_CHARGE_THRESH_BAT0/1:  0(off)..96(default)..99
* STOP_CHARGE_THRESH_BAT0/1:   1..100(default)

+++ ThinkPad Battery Status: BAT0 (Main / Internal)
/sys/class/power_supply/BAT0/manufacturer                   = LGC
/sys/class/power_supply/BAT0/model_name                     = 45N1738
/sys/class/power_supply/BAT0/cycle_count                    =      3
/sys/class/power_supply/BAT0/energy_full_design             =  74050 [mWh]
/sys/class/power_supply/BAT0/energy_full                    =  74050 [mWh]
/sys/class/power_supply/BAT0/energy_now                     =  59250 [mWh]
/sys/class/power_supply/BAT0/power_now                      =  13722 [mW]
/sys/class/power_supply/BAT0/status                         = Discharging

/sys/class/power_supply/BAT0/charge_control_start_threshold =      0 [%]
/sys/class/power_supply/BAT0/charge_control_end_threshold   =    100 [%]
/sys/class/power_supply/BAT0/charge_behaviour               = [auto] inhibit-charge force-discharge

Charge                                                      =   80.0 [%]
Capacity                                                    =  100.0 [%

I checked, I do not have an internal battery installed.

I also repasted the CPU and GPU when I opened it.

Thanks again for helping me pick a distro in my other post! Everything is up and running nicely with Linux mint. I even set up Lutris, Steam, and a bunch of utility apps. I still need to set an FPS limit somehow because this thing PULLS in old games.

PS I promise that trackpad is clean lol, looks so dirty in the piciture.

View original on lemmy.zip
sh.itjust.works

sounds like a dead cell, I've had batteries that drop abruptly like that and I think that's what it is.

If you're looking for a new battery though, I've had lots of luck with kingsener. Their batteries are built well too (as in the casing) which is important when the grip pads are on the battery

4
87Sixreply
lemmy.zip

Huh

It's actually a KingSener battery haha. I guess I'll message them and ask about this giving the details from above as well. Though I don't really expect them to warranty it all the way from China for how cheap the battery was (40 euro shipping included)

Also yea the pads on the bottom of the battery are really nice whereas the ones on my laptop are visibly worn.

2
Jumutareply
sh.itjust.works

oh that's really weird, I think you should contact them for warranty.

It could just be that the calibration is off though, I remember reading somewhere that these aftermarket bats don't have calibration support in the firmware

2

I'm now thinking that it just takes a long while to calibrate. I've discharged it again and this time it went lower in % before shutting off.

I'll keep going for a bit and see if my discharge profile adjusts. Will update :-)

1

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[SOLVED?] Thinkpad T470p Mint battery recalibration | Spyke